Rahul Gandhi’s job lessons at OBC meet has Coke-shikanji twist

Addressing the conclave, Rahul said, “In a way, India has been enslaved by two or three leaders of the BJP and the RSS…. The entire Opposition…are getting united and you will see (the results) in the next six or seven months, or one year.”

He said, “Narendra Modi, (BJP president) Amit Shah and (RSS chief) Mohan Bhagwat will get a taste of India’s strength…. They will understand that India cannot be run by two or three people. India can be run by India’s people and the youth.”

Asking the audience who had started Coca-Cola company, Rahul replied, after a pause, “The person who started Coca-Cola Company was a shikanji seller in the US. He used to mix sugar with water. His experience and skill bore fruit and he got the funding, and Coca-Cola Company was created.”

He then contended that McDonald’s was founded by a person who used to run a dhaba.  “It is not that India’s mechanics did not have the potential as that of Ford or Mercedes. It is that if the doors of bank are open for Ford, Mercedes, then doors of banks and politics are shut for our dhabawalas, mechanics and dhobis (washer people) and other backwards,” he said.

Coca-Cola’s website says the company was founded by John S Pemberton, who was a pharmacist. McDonald’s website says its founder Ray Kroc had earlier worked as a Red Cross ambulance driver, and subsequently as a piano player, and salesman. In 1954, he found a small and successful restaurant run by brothers Dick and Mac McDonald, who were looking for a new franchising agent. A year later, Kroc founded McDonald’s System, Inc.

During his 25-minute address, Rahul also said that tailors are the real fashion designers, and that skilled workers remain in the shadows in India. “We want to put you in the bus and give you the keys, while the BJP wants to put you in the bus and run the bus itself,” he said.

He also said, “The Prime Minister says there is dearth of skill (among people) in the country. This is not true.”

Slamming Rahul’s remarks, Union minister Ram Kripal Yadav said, “The Congress has been in power for decades… and a decade just before 2014. It is strange that Rahul Gandhi remembers the OBCs now.” He accused the Congress of not taking any major initiative for the OBCs.

On Tuesday, Rahul is set to hold a two-hour interaction with booth-level Congress workers in Mumbai. Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam on Monday said more than 15,000 workers are expected to attend the event.